


tempest

by snugglepup



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Medieval, F/F, F/M, Fluff, Gods, Magic, POV Second Person
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-05-19
Updated: 2014-05-19
Packaged: 2018-01-25 17:44:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,937
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1656941
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/snugglepup/pseuds/snugglepup
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"So tell me again exactly why all of you are traipsing around with your little component bags and holy symbols and creepy murder-trophies and shit and I'm the team pack horse carrying like eight thousand pounds of crap?" The constant clinking in the heavy bag strapped to your back is a reminder of how well today went, but you're sick of having to carry all of this shit, not to mention worn out from carrying it uphill while baking in the afternoon sun. At least it's slowly cooling off as you gain altitude. "I'd also like to know why didn't we sleep through to nightfall before doing this. Kanaya, if all this daylight bullshit you keep making me deal with fucks up my blessed eye I swear to the Twenty I'm gonna kill you in your sleep." She glances over her shoulder and makes sure you see her roll her eyes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	tempest

_these are not words, they're only feelings_

_there are no sounds that you can hear_

_there is no form that you can touch_

_there are no colors for you to see_

_vnv nation - tempest_

* * *

"So tell me again exactly why all of you are traipsing around with your little component bags and holy symbols and creepy murder-trophies and shit and I'm the team pack horse carrying like eight thousand pounds of crap?" The constant clinking in the heavy bag strapped to your back is a reminder of how well today went, but you're sick of having to carry all of this shit, not to mention worn out from carrying it _uphill_ while baking in the afternoon sun. At least it's slowly cooling off as you gain altitude. "I'd also like to know why didn't we sleep through to nightfall before doing this. Kanaya, if all this daylight bullshit you keep making me deal with fucks up my blessed eye I swear to the Twenty I'm gonna kill you in your sleep." She glances over her shoulder and makes sure you see her roll her eyes.

"You're carrying all the thit becauthe you're the throngetht, V-Eth, and it'th gonna be dark again thoon tho quit complaining," Sollux says, and you want to smack him upside the head. Or maybe just shank the smug son of a bitch.

"Oh, so it's a caste thing, what a bloodpusher-warming sentiment. Shouldn't you be dealing with some of this crap just as punishment for that stunt you pulled this morning?"

"If you're referring to the spell that happened to save all of our lives, I am not so sure that punishment is the appropriate course of action."

"That spell was either gonna save us or kill us all, and hey bitch, it's easy to look on the bright side when you weren't the one eight feet away from the _massive pillar of flames_."

"Tho you're bitching about me thaving your life with a rithky gamble. Doeth anyone elthe here thmell thomething funny? I can almoth tell what it ith... oh, now I've got it, it'th fucking hypocrithy."

"I am glad that I'm not the only one to notice!" The team's resident wild card and terrifying murderer sniffs at the air while continuing to idly flip the busted-up silver coin she always keeps close at hand. "Also, your sweat smells like rotten blueberries and it's gross."

"Jeeeeeeeez, sorry for having a normal bodily reaction to being forced to carry a giant sack of _practically everything we own_ up a mountain. Should we even be going through here, anyway? Nobody's mapped this route, and I would know, so what if it just dead-ends somewhere? Or what if it's not mapped because everybody who tried to come through this way _died?_ "

"There'th no more voitheth around than anywhere elthe and they're not thaying anything interethting. Actually there'th _leth_ voitheth than motht platheth, tho can you jutht shut up for two thecondth, holy shit."

"What's wrong, blueberry? I thought you had, and I quote, ' _aaaaaaaall_ the luck.'"

"I believe she is simply taking out her frustration on the rest of us by subjecting us to this endless stream of complaints. Vriska, are you aware that you're dangerously close to sounding like Karkat right now? Are you perhaps in danger of taking up a red-crested shield and sickle?"

You hiss at her and then just give up and carry on. Hours pass mostly in silence apart from occasional bickering and Kanaya mumbling pointless prayers to the Sylph. It seems to you like any goddess who'd revoke a cleric's power just because she didn't pray often enough would have to real petty, but nothing you've said about it to the idiot about it ever gets through to her anyway. It's dusk in a small valley high in the midst of the range when Sollux, currently in front because he doesn't have the sense to stay in the rear like any sane caster would, motions for the group to stop.

"It'th quiet," he says, and when he looks back over his shoulder he actually seems kind of scared.

"So what? It's dusk in the middle of nowhere, we're not exactly in noise central."

"No, dumbath. It'th _quiet._ I can't hear the dead at all. Not even one voithe."

"Great, so nobody's ever died here, I think in any reasonable person's mind that would be a good thing."

"V-Eth, shut up and think for a thecond. There'th nowhere in the world where _nothing'th died for tho many thenturieth that even the echoeth are gone._ "

"He has a point! Something smells wrong here and it is more than just your fluids."

"Could you seriously not have picked a less disgusting way to phrase that?" Then Kanaya takes in a sharp breath and everyone turns to look at her.

"There's something moving in this space," she says, "and I think it's alive, but it is unquestionably not life as we would typically define the term."

That's when the wind picks up and fast, flattening tough mountain grasses to the ground and practically deafening you with the rustle of the leaves of nearby trees and the creak of their branches as they bend and smaller ones snap off entirely.

"Sollux, I believe this would be an excellent time to cast some sort of analyzing spell." She's keeping up her usual aloof demeanor but it's not hard to sense the fear underlying her words. "The life I am sensing is now spread throughout every inch of my detection radius and I suspect a rather larger area than that."

You're pretty fucking sure you should be freaked out right now, but... for some reason you're just _not._ It's not something you can even explain to yourself. The others are scared, except maybe Terezi, because you're still not really sure if she's even capable of that emotion, who knows, but you're unruffled. Well, not counting your hair, which is in your eyes and generally just all over the place.

"Everything smells blue," your mercenary friend says, "and I think that I can taste something similar! It is up to the rest of you to figure out whatever that means." You still don't buy her bullshit about learning to smell and taste shit from a dragon but you've known her long enough to be sure the smelling and tasting part itself is definitely eight hundred percent real, which is good because blind trolls don't tend to make the best mercenaries or adventurers. As Sollux finishes an incantation you realize that if she can taste something, then there must be color on her tongue...

"Oh shit," Sollux says, and when you look away from Terezi again you see long faint wisps of something blue in the air, circling around and in between all of you, and for some reason you think it's sticking around you specifically more than anyone else. So much for luck, thanks a lot, Thief, you'll give a bitch your divine blessing but steal all of the good fortune back whenever you feel like it. "It'th not magic, whatever it ith, or if it ith magic then it'th way thtronger magic than I can handle."

"It would be convenient if the source of all this was at least visible," Kanaya says a bit too casually, and you realize that they must not be able to see the the blue stuff at all, which means you're seeing it because of your vision eightfold. "Particularly considering that the amount of life nearby is increasing very quickly."

It's only a second or two after she's done talking that the blue stuff everywhere starts to coalesce sort of into one place, which is maybe what she's sensing. The wind dies down for a moment and then a massive blast of it almost bowls over Terezi and Kanaya and knocks Sollux on his ass. You get pushed back some, but it looks like carrying all of that bullshit with you actually turned out to be in your favor after all.

The blue wisps have taken a shape vaguely resembling a troll or maybe a human, it's kind of hard to tell; you don't think you see horns, but then who the hell even knows what this thing is?

"Hey," you say without really meaning to, the words sort of just falling out of some part of your mind you apparently don't have control over, "chill out, you're fucking up my hair."

All three of your friends turn to stare at you like you're insane and a weird whispery giggle passes by your head, startling you into taking a step back and almost tripping over a rock.

"Uh, who are you talking to right now, thyco," Sollux says.

"She is speaking to whatever that thing in the air is, silly," Terezi says, a hand hovering near the grip of her sword.

The boom of wind and noise that follows isn't exactly deafening but it's almost loud enough to hurt your aural canals.

" _WHO DARES TO DEFILE MY LAND WITH THEIR PRESENCE? SPEAK YOUR NAMES NOW OR DIE IN AGONY."_ That's, uh, that's sure something to hear. As the voice speaks, the wispy figure in the air becomes steadily more solid, taking on a form that definitely looks human considering there's enough definition to it now that if there were supposed to be horns you'd be able to see them by now.

"Th-Thollux Captor."

"Kanaya Maryam, devout of the Sylph of Space."

"Terezi Pyrope!"

"Go fuck yourself." Everyone, even Terezi, looks at you in shock and horror. Wind whips around your head again and slaps your hair into your face. "Pfhfgh, hey, cut it out, asshole! I said to stop messing with my hair. Kill us or don't or whatever, just quit it with the damn theatrics."

"Blueberry, I think you may have finally succeeded in making all four of us dead! Oh well, it was bound to happen eventually. By the way, windy thing, you smell nice."

"Hey, thanks!" Whoever's speaking is definitely not the storm of a voice from before. Or is it? This voice sounds kind of like a cheerful teenage boy, and you're pretty sure it's the same one that was giggling at you a minute ago. "Fine, I'll leave your hair alone if you stop being so rude, does that sound fair?"

"Sure, whatever. So if you're not gonna kill us, what do you want from us?" Why aren't you running for your life right now? What made you think saying any of that was _remotely_ a good idea? And why are you still not even slightly worried?

There's a long silence that's finally broken by Sollux.

"It'th a wind thpirit, and it'th powerful ath _fuck,_ " he says. "They're thuppothed to be tricktherth, tho it wath probably never gonna kill uth, but I didn't think any thpirith thith major would meth around like that."

" _Ouch_ , dude, didn't your lusus teach you not to call anybody 'it' unless they want you to? Also, there aren't any wind spirits as strong as me or even close. You're a mage, you should know that!"

"If you are not a spirit, then what are you?" Kanaya asks. The winds earlier pushed her back farther than you and so you see her eyes widen before she suddenly kneels and bows her head. "I apologize," she says. "Please forgive our transgressions. We did not realize we were on holy ground."

"Oooh, see, _she_ knows what's up, even if the bowing is kind of excessive and totally awkward," the thing says. "But hey, trust a cleric to know a god when she meets one!"


End file.
